Adopt a Film

A little while ago, we received the films we had preserved as a pilot project and now, I'm continuing another project, "Adopt a Film," coordinating with several university departments, namely the Office of University Development. The Archives is working to raise money for the preservation of deteriorating film from the 1930s to 1960s from the Department of Athletics. Mostly game films from football, track and field, and basketball, these films capture the moments during a period when CUA was highly competitive in these sports, moments that need to be preserved.

Alumni will be asked to donate money for the preservation of their legacy, and from what I hear, they're already excited!

Let's Talk Stock

Did you know that there are no longer any producers of magnetic audio tape (reel to reel)? Did you know that there is now only one producer of gold-standard CDs and DVDs (in the UK)? Did you know that VHS tape stock is probably the next to disappear?

Companies like Imation, 3M, and Sony have been shifting to producing electronic media and computer data tape, but no longer audio visual tape media. What does this mean for archivists?

1) Competing with collectors.
Do you know collectors? Have you actually talked to one? During grad school, collectors were presented as the obsessive patrons that lurk around special collections and try to steal your valuable (monetary or intrinsic) materials (as in The Island of Lost Maps). After meeting a lot of collectors at the ARSC conference last year, I realized that although they can be obsessive (but aren't we all?), they are usually ahead of archivists, predicting technological trends, especially when it comes to obsolescence. They collect prior to the format disappearing, rather than once the formats are no longer used prominently. If you want stock, start compiling it now because in another few years, it's not going to be accessible!

2) Re-thinking migration programs.
If your archive was fortunate enough to start an analog to analog carrier migration program, you'll no longer be able to buy new stock. Sure, you can buy old stock, stock that might be degraded as much as the tape you're trying to transfer. You can also buy re-purposed blank stock--tapes that have been used and are in good enough condition to be re-used. You could also redesign your migration program to go digital. Which brings us to...

3) Going digital!
Do you have a Content Management System (CMS)? Are you developing it? You're really going to need one unless you want a lot of files without metadata floating around on your server in a few years.

4) Developing digital standards.
Do the research. ARSC and AMIA have great technical guidelines and recommendations, but you need to find what will work practically for your archive.

5) Re-thinking grants.
Preservation grant standards have changed (or should be changing soon)! Analog to analog is dead. It's analog to digital or even digital to digital.

Archiving From Home

Over the weekend, I was still helping my boyfriend unpack his new condo, and we came across his three very large boxes of VHS tapes that have been packed since his move in Dec 2008. The plan was for one of his more tech-savvy friends to transfer them. Well, that hasn't happened yet, and now I've been recruited to find a cheap way of transferring these to a DVD-quality file (not archival-quality) on a hard drive.

I'm looking at some analog to digital converters, and software programs for him. He has a Mac, so it should be pretty easy to start, though it will take quite a while to complete. Though this machine/software doesn't say if it's Mac-compatible, it looks decent. The reviews are better than other converters, and I was wondering if anyone had used it, personally. I was also thinking of just going the easy route and buying a more simple piece of equipment.

Issues In The Reel World

I spent the majority of today working on my audio reel set-up and transferred the first reel using the new set-up, the Mac, and Logic Express. It was also the first reel I had worked on that was recorded at 3 3/4. I thought everything was good to go (3 3/4 button depressed and everything) and when I started the digital transfer, I heard a chipmunk instead of a soprano! After messing with settings on the computer (because I thought I took care of everything on the hardware end), I finally listened to the recording through the reel player and discovered it wasn't doing what it was supposed to be doing. A colleague then found a great site for me, obsolete media, which has a manual for my reel player! After searching discovering that I had to remove a post sheath, and then not-so-gently coaxing a sheath off of a post that had not been removed in over decade, I got everything running again, the soprano started singing, and the digitization was running.

End of story? Not quite.

We got Logic Express for the great metadata it creates and allows. All of the administrative metadata is there, but I'm having trouble finding the menu to input descriptive metadata. There's always tomorrow!

Personal Archivist For Hire

Sometimes I feel like a personal archivist-for-hire.

When I was starting along this path and joked with my family "If you need something preserved, you know who to ask!" they laughed. Okay, not the same as "Now that I'm an accountant, I'll do your taxes for free," but I meant well.

Now I've taken on a project for each side of my family--a photo preservation project from my mom's side and a mixed material collection (cloth, medals, documents, tin-types, etc.) of Civil War era from my dad's side (from Peter Pike, who served in the war).

Recently, my boyfriend has realized the potential of my tech side ("Can you look at my printer?" "Why doesn't this file work on this computer?"). I de-acidified and housed his newspaper from the Red Sox World Series win for a gift. We've been packing his stuff since he's moving next week, and he found a few magazines from the same time, and he wants those preserved, too. He also has quite the collection of movies on VHS, DVD, and Blueray. Somehow we got on the topic of me transferring audio for work and that somehow translated into me transferring his VHS to a hard drive. I said "Just as soon as I figure out how to do that for work..."

I've Been Thinking...

I've been thinking that I should get together a poster session or something on what I've been doing on the audio digitization process at CUA for the SAA poster presentations. I mean, what I'm doing isn't new--there are plenty of music libraries and archives that have had audio preservation and digitization programs running for a while--but what I'm doing is unique in that it's basically designing and running the program. I've made necessary connections at the university and in the field who are my technical consultants, I'm using students to do processing, and my bosses have to approve of the program I'm implementing, but it's basically me.

That's pretty freaking awesome, and a notable innovation. Fully utilizing modern technologies (in creative ways) has allowed me to create this program from nearly nothing. Other than the expense of the computer (which needed updating anyway), the expense of iLogic Express (software), and the expense of one book, I've accomplished what I've done so far using free resources and my connections. The audio equipment I'm using was all located at the university, and also free. Soon, I will be asking about $500 for a mixer and analog to digital converter so I can have a professional audio setup so multiple formats can be digitized in-house. I attended a CCAHA workshop on a/v digitization in October and was given the estimate of $50,000 for an audio digitization program, with several people working towards establishing it. By the end of setting this up, I hope to have had the Archives spend less than $3,000. I bring in more money a year for photo digitization requests.

If I can get a poster presentation together, archivists will know how easy establishing an audio program is. SAA needs support all record types.

Audio Project Process

Both of my practicum students start next week--one on Monday, one on Friday. But other than teaching them about archives, I think my week will be back to normal--minimal photo requests and focusing on the School of Music audio project.

The "database" is ready. I have arranged for the transferral of the last eight boxes of reels to the Archives for Thursday, and I also have the a music technician who works at the Music Library coming over to help me set up the reel player, and examine my equipment on Thursday. On Monday or Tuesday I am going to start writing the in-house procedures manual for the standards I have chosen and the steps I have decided to take in the preservation/digitization process. I have yet to order re-housing supplies, but the discs have been re-housed, and some formats (like the cassettes) shouldn't need re-housed, so I will have my students start with those.

The team of people who worked on the Sound Directions project and wrote the manual did a great job. This is going to be a great test of how one person can emulate and adapt that process for a small institution (but not a small project).

I am documenting everything. Someone should be able to learn from my insanity.

In the Process...

Today was a photo day. Sort of.

I had every intention of working on my audio project, but between meetings about a large request using the Office of Public Affairs Photo Collection (a very LARGE collection, in the process of being processed), a photo digitization project (finalizing requirements and the statement of work with a vendor), transferring almost 300 GB (yes, I do mean GigaByte) of digital photos, and preparing for the transfer of almost that much more, and going through records concerning photos, it became a photo day.

Today I felt like a lot of my projects would be staying "in the process" for a while...

Outreach Done Well!

You know you're doing something right when a professor approaches you, said he heard about a film in your collections from one of his colleagues, and would like to get some people to donate to the cause to have it preserved and digitized! Even though this wasn't a severely deteriorating film I am currently trying to preserve from the Department of Athletics Collection, the film does need some work--slight warping, it broke while playing, very slight vinegar syndrome. The content, however, is completely unique! A former female anthropology professor, Dr. Regina Herzfeld, did field studies and interviews with Native American groups, and there is a lot of interaction between her and the Native American women--a rare occurrence. It's a relatively high-demand film (for the Archives), played about once a year, and having a digital copy would definitely help us out, but because it is relatively playable, it's not high on our priority list.

I received the initial description-based estimate from ColorLab today, and passed it to my interested parties. I hoped to get this project going soon, but once the professor saw the price tag, well, he's still interested, just slightly less so. He's compiling a longer list of people to seek donations from...

Modifying the OAIS

Today I read IASA's Guidelines on the Production...IASA-TC04, Chapter 7: Small Scale Approaches to Digital Storage Systems. This chapter simplified the OAIS (Open Archival Information System), and highlighted the most important aspects and provided cost-efficient recommendations for smaller institutions or small digital collection projects.

As I prepare a workflow for the School of Music audio project, I will have to examine the OAIS, and try to simplify steps. An OAIS consists of:
1) Ingest
2) Access
3) Administration
4) Data Management
5) Preservation Planning
6) Archival Storage

I will not be able to simplify the digitization (ingest), but if I can implement Dspace earlier on (if CUA has continued access and support to the Digital Object Catalog), I might be able to simply access.

Final comment--I was comforted to see that one sub-section in the chapter was titled "Single (or Double) Operator Storage System." I'm not the only a/v digitization team of one!

Project Planning-Audio Digitization

I have been reading Sound Directions: Best Practices for Audio Preservation and IASA's Guidelines on the Production and Preservation of Digital Audio Objects in preparation of planning not only an audio digitization project, but planning audio digitization standards for the CUA Archives.

I became quite overwhelmed from all the technical terms and processes today, so I decided to take a quick step ahead and do some project planning, based on logical steps taken while developing a normal digitization plan (names have been eliminated for privacy). Am I missing anything, at least in the preliminary stages? Anything I won't discover while doing the rest of my reading?

Project Plan for the School of Music Audio Digitization Program

People Involved:
Robin C. Pike, Audio Visual Archivist
Audio Visual Archivist’s student assistant
Possible practicum students or other student workers
Head Archivist and Associate Archivist, supervisors
Music Librarians
Other technical support staff?

1) PRELIMINARY:

a. Inventory A/V Equipment
i. Student Assistant creates inventory and shelflist
ii. I update Shelflist database

b. Set up equipment to MAC
i. Consult music librarians
ii. Reel player is priority
iii. Might need new analog to digital convertor
iv. Set up other audio equipment and possibly VHS/Beta, later

c. Organize Audio Materials
i. Work with Music Library and CPIT to accession rest of collection
ii. Research standards for cataloging audio
iii. Create cataloging schema
iv. Order re-housing supplies
v. Process Collection
- Student Assistant and student workers create inventory
-- Student workers note preservation concerns
- Re-house collection
- Student Assistant and student workers research and write history of the Music Department; consult with Music Librarians
- Student Assistant and other student workers create rest of finding aid parts

d. Research Digitization and Digital Preservation
i. ARSC sources, namely Sound Directions and IASA Guidelines book
ii. Set in-house standards and methods
iii. Order and set up preservation formats

2) ACTIONS

a. Preservation
i. Preservation notes from processing used
ii. Preserve materials as preparation for digitization

b. Digitization
i. Clean and oil machine well, and frequently
ii. Clean materials prior to preservation
iii. Digitize using Audacity or iLogic Express
iv. Save to formats, etc.

3) ONLINE
a. Upload to Web server
i. via WRLC? Omeka? Other?

4) ONGOING PRESERVATION AND DIGITAL PRESERVATION
a. Work with people in charge of Web server
b. Monitor preservation masters, and original

A Little Archiving From My Hometown...

I just saw a story on the AMIA listserv on preserving archival footage from WQED, a local broadcasting company in Pittsburgh, PA. The preservation action was performed by Preservation Technologies (a cool place to tour if you get the chance!) in Cranberry, PA, about an hour north of Pittsburgh. If you're familiar with WQED, you know they produced such amazing shows as Mister Rogers' Neighborhood (which are being preserved), along with many other PBS productions.

This grant-funded project is a rare opportunity for a public station because these types of stations cannot afford a project on this scale using their typical operating budget.

I can't wait to see the result of this mass digitization project!

Back to Work!

It's Monday and I'm back at work after a two-week vacation! I was compiling projects for the upcoming semester. What's on deck?

*Digitizing two scrapbooks from a alumni's father (the father was also an alumni), and creating the corresponding photo digital collections;
*School of Music audio recording project, consisting of organizing, re-housing, processing, researching digitization and digital preservation standards, digitizing, and cataloging;
*Department of Athletics film preservation and digitization project, consisting of working with a vendor to preserve and digitize the films, and then marketing the films to the university community properly to acquire funds to digitize more films;
*Finish EAD finding aids for two large university photo collections;
*Finish the A/V website coding (one page left!);
*Re-house a large portion of the audio and moving image media in the archives (when moving materials, I discovered the poor housing was leading to deterioration of some audio and films);
*Not go crazy attempting to finish all of this by May-ish.
Goals vs. what will actually be completed... Let's see how much I can do!

Library of Congress Saves Films!

On the Media--Film Buff

The Library of Congress has established a National Film Registry to preserve the legacy of some of the best films of all time, but among the submissions were orphan films--historical films, corporate films, and ameteur art/music films that are little known, often not associated with an author, causing them to be forgotten about and rarely preserved. With the Library of Congress's help, these films are being preserved and digitized, saving a legacy otherwise not known.

NPR: On the Media did a story on these orphan films.

Fantastic Films (2)

On Friday I got the estimate from our film vendor, and because of the severe deterioration of the films, after closer inspection, the five cost almost twice as much as the Archives wanted to spend! So, we're going with my original idea of preserving three films and pursuing donors to save the other films (now more donors than we initially thought).

I chose three from the five, and it hurt to know that the other two might not be able to be saved because we can't afford it right now. I feel like I'm abandoning my cat, or something. I care about these vinegar-smelling pieces of acetate.

*Sob*

I digress...

The films that will be saved are as follows:
"Old Film" ca. 1939 (I'm hoping this is a film of the record-setting football team, the year they went to the Sun Bowl)
"Track and Field. Zuppa Doyle runs a mile for CUA" (Record-setting event)
"CUA Football" ca. late 1920s or 1930s (possibly from the year the team went to the Orange Bowl, but probably game footage from when the team was prominent in the USA).

I made the tearful selection, got back to our rep, and got as much as I could do taken care of. Hopefully this project will get off the ground in January, and be finished in the first few months of the new year! My next step is to approach the Offices of University Development and Alumni Relations to see how we can market these DVDs to interested alumni and their families, so we can get more money to digitize more films.

Reading Resources

In my attempt to get the audio preservation and digitization programs off the ground in the Archives, I have been doing an excessive amount of research and reading lately, mostly from THE reading list provided by the ARSC Technical Committee.

I had to take a sick day today, so I'm trying to get through (at least a part of) resource #2: Guidelines on the Production and Preservation of Digital Audio Objects. Kevin Bradley, Editor. Aarhus, Denmark: International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives (IASA), 2004.

I have some catching up to do!

Fantastic Films

After wrapping up discussions on the reception last night, I erased quite a few things from my to-do dry erase board, and added my new projects. In the next week and two days I will be starting to focus solely on the CUA School of Music audio recordings, and the CUA Department of Athletics films. I made great progress today, which has left me in a super happy mood!

I talked with my supervisor about starting the film preservation/digitization project. Starting is a lose term because I located two collections of severely degraded films a little over a year ago. I had students perform surveys (library students who jumped to have the experience to learn about and survey film, not that were grudingly stuck with vinegar syndrome films) to complete an inventory but to also survey preservation concerns. I met with Russ Suniewick, President (and representative) of ColorLab, a film laboratory and telecine service, who appraised the films, took the surveys, and provided an estimate soon after.

And then we sat on those estimates because we didn't have the money to do either large project. I proposed doing a few films as a pilot project to my supervisors, and then we can use this pilot project to get money from donors who can help us to complete this project. However, I could not pursue this project because of the reception.

Today was a day for new goals.

Today I contacted our sales rep, agreed on a price and type of project we are looking to do, re-reviewed the inventory, selected the five films (based on level of deterioration and potential for popularity and donor appeal), and FedEx-ed them off to ColorLab!

Tomorrow, audio!